BANGALORE: Douglas Alexander, minister of state for E-commerce and
Competitiveness, the UK, is slated for his maiden visit to Bangalore on November
1 and 2, coinciding with the IT.com 2001 fair. On the inaugural day, the
minister will address a seminar on "IT for the common man" and is
scheduled to meet Karnataka’s IT minister B K Chandrashekar. He will also
deliver a keynote address at the "Invest UK" meet.
According to Kelvin Green, second secretary, British Trade Office, Douglas
Alexander will later in the day visit the new Wipro facility at Electronics City
and the Infosys campus, where he will meet Infosys chief N R Narayana Murthy who
is also the chairman of Indo-British Partnership (IBP).
When asked about his expectations from the IT fair, he said, "We see
ourselves as the natural gateway to the European market. Also, we are actively
encouraging Indian companies and providing support and services for their
establishment there. At the moment we are focussing to maintain our high profile
offerings in India. This apart, we have the Invest UK, a British government
agency, promoting inward investment into the UK". He added, "Of the
18,000 work permit visas opened for software professionals, 11,000 selected are
Indians and we hope to increase it in future.
He said that the UK was the third largest investment partner in India for
2000-2001 after US and Mauritius. He added that his government would focus on
emerging areas like biotechnology and IT services, e-commerce and other such
niche segments. After the last edition of IT.com, 21 companies had moved to
India to set up base, he said.